1<!doctype html><html lang=en><head><meta charset=UTF-8><title>Jeffrey Paul: Don't Talk About Your Health Unless It's Good</title><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/css/pygments.css><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/css/hel.css><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/fontawesome-free-5.12.1-web/css/all.min.css><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/css/bootstrap-3.3.5.min.css><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/fonts/cm/Serif/cmun-serif.css><link rel=stylesheet href=/s/css/sneakberlin.css><link rel=alternate type=application/rss+xml title="Jeffrey Paul RSS" href=/feed.xml><meta name=description content="The title of this post is a bit of wisdom passed down from my grandfather. Itâs sage advice, and something that I think more people should hear. Health issuesâ¦"><meta name=author content="Jeffrey Paul"><meta name=theme-color content="#ffffff" media="(prefers-color-scheme: light)"><meta name=theme-color content="#111111" media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)"><meta property="og:site_name" content="Jeffrey Paul"><meta property="og:title" content="Don't Talk About Your Health Unless It's Good"><meta property="og:type" content="article"><meta property="og:url" content="https://sneak.berlin/20200204/dont-talk-about-your-health/"><meta property="og:description" content="The title of this post is a bit of wisdom passed down from my grandfather. Itâs sage advice, and something that I think more people should hear. Health issuesâ¦"><meta property="og:image" content="https://sneak.berlin/s/img/jp.jpg"><meta name=twitter:site content="@sneakdotberlin"><meta name=twitter:creator content="@sneakdotberlin"><meta name=twitter:title content="Don't Talk About Your Health Unless It's Good"><meta name=twitter:description content="The title of this post is a bit of wisdom passed down from my grandfather. Itâs sage advice, and something that I think more people should hear. Health issuesâ¦"><meta name=twitter:card content="summary"><meta name=twitter:image content="https://sneak.berlin/s/img/jp.jpg">
1<script type=application/ld+json>{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Person","name":"Jeffrey Paul","alternateName":"sneak","url":"https://sneak.berlin","image":"https://sneak.berlin/s/img/jp.jpg","email":"[email protected]","telephone":"+13123610355","jobTitle":"Founder","worksFor":[{"@type":"Organization","name":"EEQJ","url":"https://eeqj.com"},{"@type":"Organization","name":"keytern.al","url":"https://keytern.al"}],"address":{"@type":"PostalAddress","addressLocality":"Berlin","addressCountry":"DE"},"knowsAbout":["Computer Security","Cryptography","Privacy","Software Engineering"],"sameAs":["https://bbs.sneak.berlin/u/sneak","https://s.sneak.berlin/@sneak","https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=sneak","https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Sneak","https://git.eeqj.de/sneak","https://github.com/sneak","https://gitlab.com/sneakdotberlin","https://twitter.com/sneakdotberlin"]}</script>
1<script type=text/javascript>var _paq=window._paq||[];_paq.push(["trackPageView"]),_paq.push(["enableLinkTracking"]),function(){t="https://t.sneak.cloud/",_paq.push(["setTrackerUrl",t+"js/"]),_paq.push(["setSiteId","1"]);var t,n=document,e=n.createElement("script"),s=n.getElementsByTagName("script")[0];e.type="text/javascript",e.async=!0,e.defer=!0,e.src=t+"js/",s.parentNode.insertBefore(e,s)}()</script>
1<noscript><p><img src="https://t.sneak.cloud/js/?idsite=1&rec=1" style=border:0 alt></p></noscript></head><body><section id=page class=container><div class=row id=blogpagecontainerrow><h1 id=nameheader><a href=/>Jeffrey Paul</a></h1><h1>Don't Talk About Your Health Unless It's Good<br><small>4 February 2020</small><br><small>(798 words, approximately 4 minutes reading time.)</small></h1><div class=col-md-8 id=blogpagearticlecontent><p>The title of this post is a bit of wisdom passed down from my grandfather. It’s 2sage advice, and something that I think more people should hear.</p><p>Health issues are one of those things like vacation photos: they’re really only 3interesting to you, or perhaps your immediate family. Beyond that, nobody really 4gives a shit. Talking about any feature of your health whatsoever in anything 5other than a positive light is a bad move for your social or professional life. 6Here’s why.</p><h1 id=information-transfer-in-society-is-tremendously-lossy>Information Transfer In Society Is Tremendously Lossy</h1><p>Think of your closest personal friends. Do you know their favorite foods? Their 7favorite colors?</p><p>How about your co-workers, associates, and staff? Do you know the names of their 8pets, all of their children?</p><p>Perhaps your circles are small enough or your memory sharp enough, but most 9people have relatively low bandwidth for receiving and memorizing details about 10others. When we construct our mental models to form our overall impressions of 11others, we do so with a startlingly limited amount of information (compared to 12what is available, either obviously or for the asking), and it’s biased toward 13the most memorable of the attributes we know about them.</p><p>This means that others’ impressions of you are going to, for the most part, be 14limited to a very terse summary that will primarily only be affected by the 15loudest or most frequent of your actions or attributes. Be aware of the effect 16your words or actions have on those around you!</p><h1 id=but-it-feels-good>But It Feels Good!</h1><p>Something’s wired in us humans to chit-chat with those around us about whatever 17we have top-of-mind. It’s a dangerous, seductive habit, for some reason that 18remains mysterious to me. Don’t fall victim to its song!</p><p>If you must chat up those in proximity, talk about things that are positive or 19beneficial, or ask others about themselves. Don’t bring up your own negative 20attributes (poor health, even sporadically, even in the past, is absolutely a 21negative attribute) for any reason. It can only hurt you!</p><h1 id=the-map-is-not-the-territory>The Map Is Not The Territory</h1><p>This goes as much for personal relationships as it does professional ones. I 22came to the realization of how much this sort of information transmission bias 23hurts us whilst talking to one of my best friends a few years ago. I had a 24partner at the time who had some minor chronic (but well-managed) health issues. 25She’d be in the hospital (not admitted, just treated) probably about once per 26year for something or other, and she’d broken a small bone in her foot the year 27prior as well.</p><p>I was talking to my friend and mentioned something about her, and he spouted off 28with a grossly exaggerated (but sincere) belief: “oh, she’s just a fuckinâ 29hypochondriac.” To him, she was always sick or otherwise troubled: he only heard 30me mention something about her health when there was an anomaly, not the 99% of 31days when she was happy and healthy and otherwise fine. The only information he 32had received was biased toward the exceptions, not the norm.</p><p>People love to talk to others about themselves, about their own impressions and 33thoughts and feelings, and especially about their beliefs or impressions of 34third parties. These impressions are never formed on scientifically sampled, 35unbiased data. Be aware of the fact that opinions will be formed and likely 36<em>shared</em> about you solely on the limited data available to 37listenersâprimarily based on what you say or write. Communicate 38deliberately.</p><h1 id=dont-be-that-guy>Don’t Be That Guy</h1><p>The effect, personally or professionally, is pretty much the same: talking about 39your health (in the common case of mentioning something less than entirely 40positive) in any way whatsoever tags you to others as someone who is sickly, 41infirm, less than hardy, or otherwise involuntarily sidelined (if even only 42occasionally), even in the case where the listener is sympathetic to your 43situation. Even if you experience health issues no more frequently than average, 44speaking about it creates a memorable record that people can use to assign these 45negative attributes to you. Why would you ever want that?</p><p>Silent, unconscious bias follows. In the <em>best</em> case, it gives people a concrete 46basis for (perhaps unfairly) thinking less of your capabilities. In the worst 47case, uncertainty about your future abilities means that you actively get 48deprioritized for the promotion, for the date, as the vendor. In the famous 49words of Remo Gaggi: “Why take a chance?”</p><p>Do the cost/benefit analysis. Does talking about these negative things help you 50or anyone else in any way? We know it has the potential to hurt. Is that 51potential offset by the benefit?</p><p>Keep your mouth absolutely and universally shut on these topics unless you’re at 52the doctor’s office. Follow the 100+ year old advice: Don’t talk about your 53health unless it’s good.</p></div><div class=col-md-4><div class=well id=blogpageata><h1>About The Author</h1><p>Jeffrey Paul is a hacker and security researcher living in 54Berlin and the founder of <a href=https://eeqj.com>EEQJ</a>, 55a consulting and research organization.</p><p><a href=mailto:[email protected]><i class="far fa-envelope"></i> [email protected]</a></p><p><a href=https://s.sneak.berlin/@sneak><i class="fab fa-mastodon"></i> @[email protected]</a></p><p><a href=https://twitter.com/sneakdotberlin><i class="fab fa-twitter"></i> @sneakdotberlin</a></p><p><a href=https://twitter.com/eeqj><i class="fab fa-twitter"></i> @eeqj</a></p><p><a href=/20200307/the-case-against-microsoft-and-github/><i class="fab fa-linkedin"></i> linkedin.com/in/jeffreypauleeqj</a></p></div></div></div></section><footer id=bodyfooter><small>© 1997-2026 Jeffrey Paul. <code>fc2d63e5</code><br>Unfadeable, so please don't try to fade this. (All rights reserved.)<br><code><a href=/.well-known/pgpkey.txt>5539 AD00 DE4C 42F3 AFE1 1575 0524 43F4 DF2A 55C2</a></code></small></footer>
55<script type=text/javascript src=https://downloads.mailchimp.com/js/signup-forms/popup/unique-methods/embed.js data-dojo-config="usePlainJson: true, isDebug: false"></script>
55<script type=text/javascript>window.dojoRequire(["mojo/signup-forms/Loader"],function(e){e.start({baseUrl:"mc.us20.list-manage.com",uuid:"3b2be684ede9aa675debfd56b",lid:"d42427e2b0",uniqueMethods:!0})})</script>
55<script src=/s/js/jquery-3.7.1.min.js defer></script>
55<script src=/s/js/retina-1.3.0.min.js defer></script>
55<script src=/s/js/segment-display.js defer></script>
55<script src=/s/js/main.js defer></script>
55<script type="module" src="https://static.cloudflareinsights.com/beacon.min.js/v31edd6df95cf4e85bb4c19e7a9bdbcba1788362987495" integrity="sha512-iIg7k2xntmwu6/uSb5tpc/hySgZc4eoL31yB29W6tJFo2akwjPWcEqnCEdJvGexCL0KEQwVYv5BlowfhVz26hg==" data-cf-beacon='{"version":"2024.11.0","token":"db2e4e5f01bb4d2882ed6348becb3f2e","r":1,"spa":2}' crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
55 56</body></html>
Line numbers count LF bytes from the start of the resource, as the search results do. Vendor segments are library code the classifier recognised; they are stored but not indexed. Bytes are shown as Latin1 characters, one per byte.